While If there's one thing you can say about Clone, they're not as serious
offstage as they are on.

Last July 29, 2000 at Mayric's, the techno trio (2 keyboardists with
loads of gear and a vocalist) took the stage in-between two rock bands
and after a lengthy set-up time, drowned us in a world of sexy soulful
electronic music. And they played all originals. Weird-ass songs with
real lyrics and verses and choruses, but with all those little squeaks
and drums which bang around like mice in a dirty kitchen.
___ The band was a picture of sweat and determination. Their keyboards
and equipment filled so much of the stage that their singer had to stay
on the floor. Their faces were barely ever free from perspiration and
grimace-wrinkles. Of course it could have been the heat. Ah but the sound.
What a dire contrast to the buzzsaw guitars of the other bands that night.
___ Clone, made up of Lionel and Karlo on keyboards and samplers and Sheerin
on vocals, plays a mixture of electronica, trip hop and jazz which they
like to refer to as "Adult Contemporary Electronica." You know,
mature stuff supposedly. And while they may take ages to start their set,
the wait is worth it.
___ One of their songs starts off sounding like a menacing Massive Attack
tune and when Sheerin comes into the verse, you realize she's singing
about penance and longing... in the liturgical sense. Eh? Is there such
a thing as Christian techno? And then in another trip hop tune, they sound
like their self-professed idols, Moloko, and sing about "walking
past your November... my savior can be no one but me."

Holiness and hedonism. Perfect description for the band.

Two of the members, Sheerin and Lionel used to be full-time active members
of the Bukas Palad Music Ministry, a formerly Ateneo-based liturgical
choir that propagated the mass songs of Fr.Manoling Francisco sj. They
then went on to form a showband by the name of Anima and played covers
till their noses bled. Lionel meanwhile had recorded an album of guitar-flute
instrumentals called "Vespers". Karlo on the other hand, graduated
from playing manic classical guitar in high school to fiddling with samplers
and noise. He did a track on the Rivermaya-Remixed album called "Sunog
(Lumang Eskuwela Mix)." All three got together in 1999 out of a common
desire to push music that they enjoyed and that no one else could play.
Enter CLONE.
___ They end their Mayric's set with a weirdly attractive number called
"Nothing Yet" which swings around in different time signatures
but never feels pretentious. When Sheerin veers off into a coda that goes
"la la la la" in the middle of all the despairing harmonies,
I suddenly know what music these guys grew up on.
___ New wave: Oblique lyrics, gothic themes. Love gone awry. Yearning
and angst dressed in silky melodies.

Thus
far, the band have no concrete plans or timetables. They work on music
when they have time. All three are working, and are way past the age of
high school garage bands, yet their stories of practices being interrupted
by complaining neighbors reeks of adolescenece. All three have day jobs
and responsibilities and personal goals. And somehow they find time to
sneak in Clone.
___ What for? Why enter something that you know has (1) no audience (2)
no venue for gigs and (3) no money?
___ "We're sick of cover songs," bandleader Lionel explains.
"Back in Anima, we'd play 'Celebration' every freaking gig. That
was awful."
___ Karlo, who shares none of that humiliating past adds: "We wanted
to play music that mattered to us. So what if there's no audience yet?
It's a matter of time."
___ Sheerin, the spiritual one, says: "We're doing this to give voice
to our souls."

Back at Mayric's the audience applause trickles in. Clone has ended their
set and the crowd is more baffled than appreciative. But does Clone care?
___ While lugging a keyboard case that looks more like the housing for
a bazooka, Lionel breaks into a sweaty smile and utters the night's lesson:
"Damn, that was fun!"